On November 15th, former president Donald Trump announced that he is running for a second term as president. In his speech announcing his candidacy, Trump reminded his audience of the strong economy during his presidency, and how the nation was “striding into the future, confident and so strong.” During his presidency, he explained,
everybody was doing great, men, women, African Americans, Asian Americans, Hispanic Americans, everybody was thriving like never before. There was never a time like this. We turned the page on decades of globalist sellouts and one-sided trade deals, lifted millions out of poverty, and together we built the greatest economy in the history of the world.
By most metrics, Trump is right. The American economy was doing at least as well as it did in the late 1990s, but there were records broken that had stood since the 1960s. Most demographics experienced workforce participation and income growth unmatched over five decades.
Trump also spearheaded a tax reform that inspired an unprecedented repatriation of business investments. He was the first president since at least Ronald Reagan to oversee a reduction in government regulations.
On top of his stellar economic record, Trump broke with established tradition by not starting any new wars. On the contrary, he pushed for a reduction of America’s foreign military engagement, which among other things started the process for an orderly withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan.
He never got to finish that withdrawal. Instead, President Biden made a pig’s breakfast of the whole thing.
Trump also built a record of opposition to identity politics in the military and the spreading of sexually explicit material to school children. When added to his economic policy record, this puts the former president in a strong position to win a second term in 2024.
But can he win?
Whichever candidates he will be facing in the 2024 presidential primary elections, they will be tough contenders. Running for president is not for the faint of heart. You have to have a unique combination of experience and connections.
To start with, you have to have money. Candidates who choose to take public funding are statutorily limited to how much they can spend; in 2020, that limit was $103.7 million. If they choose not to accept public money, the sky’s the limit. By some, admittedly controversial accounts, the Trump campaign spent over $1 billion in 2020. His Democrat opponent, Hillary Clinton, is said to have spent 20% more than that.
In short, running a successful, or even just credible, presidential campaign has now become a billion-dollar endeavor. You don’t raise that kind of money without having exceptionally good connections with wealthy political sponsors.
Then there is the campaign organization. Hillary Clinton is said to have had over 600 employees on her campaign, a reasonable number for someone who wants to become president. Then you have independent contractors and volunteers who provide substantial services to the campaign.
To oversee manpower of this size, you need a solid inner circle of people who will, figuratively or literally, be ready to take a bullet for you. There aren’t too many people out there whom a presidential candidate can trust at this level; finding the right individuals and securing the necessary commitment is time consuming. Not to mention the recruitment of everything from policy advisors to fundraisers to state-based campaign managers … most of whom have to be vetted with background checks and loyalty screenings.
For all these reasons, and more, the few who enter the presidential primary elections are all candidates to take seriously. Can Trump emerge in 2024 as the leader in a field of such peers?
For three reasons, the answer is ‘yes,’ but with qualifications.
First of all, Trump has indisputable experience. Not only has he been president, but he was a good president who showed that he knew how to make a difference, even as the political establishment opposed him. Obviously, there is no Republican who can match him in this regard.
Second, the former president is popular. A survey of polls published at fivethirtyeight.com suggests that Trump already has a fair chance of beating President Biden should the incumbent Democrat seek re-election. Others give the former president a more muted outlook, but Trump commands a dedicated fan base like few other politicians. His rallies for America First candidates in the midterm election campaign were consistently well attended.
In a 2024 match-up, Biden would have to count on people voting not for him, but against Trump. That is a tenuous voter base to rely on.
Third, Trump has a well-defined policy record. His conservatism is not as strong as that of other candidates, but it is far enough right-of-center that conservative voters in general identify with him. He is not a passionate social conservative, but he supported such issues as president, and he did so enough to satisfy conservative voters who put those issues first.
He also appeals to conservatives who lean more in the Reagan direction, with emphasis on low taxes and strong pro-business policies. Like no other president since Reagan, Trump worked hard to make it easier to start and run businesses in America. His deregulation policies and efforts to rein in the environmental bureaucracy were, quite frankly, unique.
The one weakness on Trump’s presidential resume as far as the economy is concerned is his relaxed attitude to the budget deficit. If America is hit by a fiscal crisis before the next election, Trump will have little to offer in terms of credibility as a fiscal hawk.
But are there other, stronger candidates? Three names have been mentioned as potential Republican primary contenders.
One of them is Ron DeSantis, who just won a convincing victory in his re-election bid as governor of Florida. He has run his state with such a strong conservative profile that it has almost taken on the status of America’s Hungary. DeSantis has fought the left’s radical social agenda everywhere from woke businesses to classrooms.
After the Disney corporation came out in support of sexual propaganda to school children, DeSantis championed a bill that removed the company’s special tax status in Florida. He stopped public funding for a new stadium for the baseball team Tampa Bay Rays when the team engaged in a campaign against gun rights.
While DeSantis cannot match Trump in presidential experience, he is the governor of the third most populous state in America. In fact, Florida has passed New York in population on his watch.
Being governor is a strong credential for a presidential candidate. Jimmy Carter was a one-term governor of Florida before being elected president in 1976. Ronald Reagan, his successor as president, was governor of California for ten years. Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas for a total of 11 years before being elected president in 1992. He was then succeeded by George Bush Jr., then governor of Texas.
In terms of popularity, Ron DeSantis is definitely a rising star among conservatives. The aforementioned fivethirtyeight.com polls suggest that DeSantis is even stronger against Biden than Trump is.
DeSantis is also in possession of a strong policy record. His willingness to fight the Left’s increasingly aggressive social agenda is well known among conservative voters. His economic-policy achievements are less pronounced, though having refrained from growing government is in itself a record to run on.
Can DeSantis beat Trump in the 2024 primaries? Possibly. His best chance is a campaign centered around social issues. If the economy is the most important issue, Trump will sail through the primaries.
Another possible Republican contender is Trump’s own vice president, Mike Pence. A former governor of Indiana, Pence is a social conservative but less impressively so than DeSantis. To Pence’s advantage speaks his combined experience as governor and vice president. Having held the number 2 spot in the White House benefited Richard Nixon in 1968 when he rode into the White House in part based on his tenure as Eisenhower’s vice president.
George Bush Sr. served as vice president under Reagan before winning the presidency in 1988.
That said, Mike Pence does not have any outstanding political qualities that raise him above the crowd. His best shot at becoming the Republican presidential nominee is if Trump and DeSantis get locked into a mutual mudslinging campaign. That would make Pence look like the civilized choice among the three.
An outlier but not at all unthinkable candidate is Nikki Haley, former governor of South Carolina and Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations. Haley shares many conservative policy positions with DeSantis and Pence, but unlike the latter, who has distanced himself from Trump since leaving office, Haley has remained friendly toward Trump. This puts her in a good position with his large voter base.
Whoever emerges as the Republican candidate in 2024, will hopefully not face Biden. His poor health, which is put on record every time he speaks and always when he speaks extemporaneously, should simply disqualify him from running again.
The problem for the Democrat party is that they do not have an obvious replacement; vice President Kamala Harris comes across as clueless every time she appears in public. That does not mean the Democrat field will be empty: expect Biden’s Transportation Secretary Peter Buttigieg to run.
A baptized Catholic, Buttigieg lives in a homosexual relationship and has two adopted children. This would work for him with left-wing Democrats and virtue-anxious liberals, but it would also be the only thing he had going for him. He has no particular policy achievement to point to.
There is one more likely 2024 presidential candidate: Liz Cheney, the outgoing Congressman from Wyoming. Having earned notoriety—more than popularity—as the leading Republican critic of former president Trump, Cheney has solidly distanced herself from the mainstream of Republican voters. For this reason alone, she is basically unthinkable as a Republican primary contender.
It is more likely, in fact, that Cheney would run as a Democrat. This would give her access to the Democrat fundraising machine, and to their entire election campaign organization. At the same time, she would be shackled to her well-established conservative record from her tenure in Congress. She would have an exceptionally difficult time convincing traditional left-of-center voters that she now supports higher taxes, abortion, single-payer health care, and sexual propaganda to school children.
Even if she managed to win the Democrat primaries, the Republican candidate running against her would easily use her ideological hypocrisy against her.
Cheney’s only real option would be to run as an independent. There is a theoretical chance that she could make it work, but even then, she would still have to defend her solidly conservative policy record. This is a repellant for some party-independent voters, and certainly for Democrats who would have their own candidate to vote for.
Her second obstacle is her lack of charisma: she simply does not connect emotionally with voters. After six years in Congress, she comes across as a political insider with the voter appeal of a dentist’s appointment: it makes intellectual sense but it does not motivate you to get out of bed in the morning.
DeSantis and Nikki Haley both have the ability to connect with people and get them emotionally invested in the candidate. But the big star here is Trump: in this category, he is simply formidable, in fact, unchallenged among likely presidential contenders for 2024.
Trump has his own issues, but in the kind of tight elections that America has gotten used to in recent years, the ability to connect with voters is essential. It could very well be what puts Trump over the finishing line in two years.
Can Trump Win Again?
On November 15th, former president Donald Trump announced that he is running for a second term as president. In his speech announcing his candidacy, Trump reminded his audience of the strong economy during his presidency, and how the nation was “striding into the future, confident and so strong.” During his presidency, he explained,
By most metrics, Trump is right. The American economy was doing at least as well as it did in the late 1990s, but there were records broken that had stood since the 1960s. Most demographics experienced workforce participation and income growth unmatched over five decades.
Trump also spearheaded a tax reform that inspired an unprecedented repatriation of business investments. He was the first president since at least Ronald Reagan to oversee a reduction in government regulations.
On top of his stellar economic record, Trump broke with established tradition by not starting any new wars. On the contrary, he pushed for a reduction of America’s foreign military engagement, which among other things started the process for an orderly withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan.
He never got to finish that withdrawal. Instead, President Biden made a pig’s breakfast of the whole thing.
Trump also built a record of opposition to identity politics in the military and the spreading of sexually explicit material to school children. When added to his economic policy record, this puts the former president in a strong position to win a second term in 2024.
But can he win?
Whichever candidates he will be facing in the 2024 presidential primary elections, they will be tough contenders. Running for president is not for the faint of heart. You have to have a unique combination of experience and connections.
To start with, you have to have money. Candidates who choose to take public funding are statutorily limited to how much they can spend; in 2020, that limit was $103.7 million. If they choose not to accept public money, the sky’s the limit. By some, admittedly controversial accounts, the Trump campaign spent over $1 billion in 2020. His Democrat opponent, Hillary Clinton, is said to have spent 20% more than that.
In short, running a successful, or even just credible, presidential campaign has now become a billion-dollar endeavor. You don’t raise that kind of money without having exceptionally good connections with wealthy political sponsors.
Then there is the campaign organization. Hillary Clinton is said to have had over 600 employees on her campaign, a reasonable number for someone who wants to become president. Then you have independent contractors and volunteers who provide substantial services to the campaign.
To oversee manpower of this size, you need a solid inner circle of people who will, figuratively or literally, be ready to take a bullet for you. There aren’t too many people out there whom a presidential candidate can trust at this level; finding the right individuals and securing the necessary commitment is time consuming. Not to mention the recruitment of everything from policy advisors to fundraisers to state-based campaign managers … most of whom have to be vetted with background checks and loyalty screenings.
For all these reasons, and more, the few who enter the presidential primary elections are all candidates to take seriously. Can Trump emerge in 2024 as the leader in a field of such peers?
For three reasons, the answer is ‘yes,’ but with qualifications.
First of all, Trump has indisputable experience. Not only has he been president, but he was a good president who showed that he knew how to make a difference, even as the political establishment opposed him. Obviously, there is no Republican who can match him in this regard.
Second, the former president is popular. A survey of polls published at fivethirtyeight.com suggests that Trump already has a fair chance of beating President Biden should the incumbent Democrat seek re-election. Others give the former president a more muted outlook, but Trump commands a dedicated fan base like few other politicians. His rallies for America First candidates in the midterm election campaign were consistently well attended.
In a 2024 match-up, Biden would have to count on people voting not for him, but against Trump. That is a tenuous voter base to rely on.
Third, Trump has a well-defined policy record. His conservatism is not as strong as that of other candidates, but it is far enough right-of-center that conservative voters in general identify with him. He is not a passionate social conservative, but he supported such issues as president, and he did so enough to satisfy conservative voters who put those issues first.
He also appeals to conservatives who lean more in the Reagan direction, with emphasis on low taxes and strong pro-business policies. Like no other president since Reagan, Trump worked hard to make it easier to start and run businesses in America. His deregulation policies and efforts to rein in the environmental bureaucracy were, quite frankly, unique.
The one weakness on Trump’s presidential resume as far as the economy is concerned is his relaxed attitude to the budget deficit. If America is hit by a fiscal crisis before the next election, Trump will have little to offer in terms of credibility as a fiscal hawk.
But are there other, stronger candidates? Three names have been mentioned as potential Republican primary contenders.
One of them is Ron DeSantis, who just won a convincing victory in his re-election bid as governor of Florida. He has run his state with such a strong conservative profile that it has almost taken on the status of America’s Hungary. DeSantis has fought the left’s radical social agenda everywhere from woke businesses to classrooms.
After the Disney corporation came out in support of sexual propaganda to school children, DeSantis championed a bill that removed the company’s special tax status in Florida. He stopped public funding for a new stadium for the baseball team Tampa Bay Rays when the team engaged in a campaign against gun rights.
While DeSantis cannot match Trump in presidential experience, he is the governor of the third most populous state in America. In fact, Florida has passed New York in population on his watch.
Being governor is a strong credential for a presidential candidate. Jimmy Carter was a one-term governor of Florida before being elected president in 1976. Ronald Reagan, his successor as president, was governor of California for ten years. Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas for a total of 11 years before being elected president in 1992. He was then succeeded by George Bush Jr., then governor of Texas.
In terms of popularity, Ron DeSantis is definitely a rising star among conservatives. The aforementioned fivethirtyeight.com polls suggest that DeSantis is even stronger against Biden than Trump is.
DeSantis is also in possession of a strong policy record. His willingness to fight the Left’s increasingly aggressive social agenda is well known among conservative voters. His economic-policy achievements are less pronounced, though having refrained from growing government is in itself a record to run on.
Can DeSantis beat Trump in the 2024 primaries? Possibly. His best chance is a campaign centered around social issues. If the economy is the most important issue, Trump will sail through the primaries.
Another possible Republican contender is Trump’s own vice president, Mike Pence. A former governor of Indiana, Pence is a social conservative but less impressively so than DeSantis. To Pence’s advantage speaks his combined experience as governor and vice president. Having held the number 2 spot in the White House benefited Richard Nixon in 1968 when he rode into the White House in part based on his tenure as Eisenhower’s vice president.
George Bush Sr. served as vice president under Reagan before winning the presidency in 1988.
That said, Mike Pence does not have any outstanding political qualities that raise him above the crowd. His best shot at becoming the Republican presidential nominee is if Trump and DeSantis get locked into a mutual mudslinging campaign. That would make Pence look like the civilized choice among the three.
An outlier but not at all unthinkable candidate is Nikki Haley, former governor of South Carolina and Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations. Haley shares many conservative policy positions with DeSantis and Pence, but unlike the latter, who has distanced himself from Trump since leaving office, Haley has remained friendly toward Trump. This puts her in a good position with his large voter base.
Whoever emerges as the Republican candidate in 2024, will hopefully not face Biden. His poor health, which is put on record every time he speaks and always when he speaks extemporaneously, should simply disqualify him from running again.
The problem for the Democrat party is that they do not have an obvious replacement; vice President Kamala Harris comes across as clueless every time she appears in public. That does not mean the Democrat field will be empty: expect Biden’s Transportation Secretary Peter Buttigieg to run.
A baptized Catholic, Buttigieg lives in a homosexual relationship and has two adopted children. This would work for him with left-wing Democrats and virtue-anxious liberals, but it would also be the only thing he had going for him. He has no particular policy achievement to point to.
There is one more likely 2024 presidential candidate: Liz Cheney, the outgoing Congressman from Wyoming. Having earned notoriety—more than popularity—as the leading Republican critic of former president Trump, Cheney has solidly distanced herself from the mainstream of Republican voters. For this reason alone, she is basically unthinkable as a Republican primary contender.
It is more likely, in fact, that Cheney would run as a Democrat. This would give her access to the Democrat fundraising machine, and to their entire election campaign organization. At the same time, she would be shackled to her well-established conservative record from her tenure in Congress. She would have an exceptionally difficult time convincing traditional left-of-center voters that she now supports higher taxes, abortion, single-payer health care, and sexual propaganda to school children.
Even if she managed to win the Democrat primaries, the Republican candidate running against her would easily use her ideological hypocrisy against her.
Cheney’s only real option would be to run as an independent. There is a theoretical chance that she could make it work, but even then, she would still have to defend her solidly conservative policy record. This is a repellant for some party-independent voters, and certainly for Democrats who would have their own candidate to vote for.
Her second obstacle is her lack of charisma: she simply does not connect emotionally with voters. After six years in Congress, she comes across as a political insider with the voter appeal of a dentist’s appointment: it makes intellectual sense but it does not motivate you to get out of bed in the morning.
DeSantis and Nikki Haley both have the ability to connect with people and get them emotionally invested in the candidate. But the big star here is Trump: in this category, he is simply formidable, in fact, unchallenged among likely presidential contenders for 2024.
Trump has his own issues, but in the kind of tight elections that America has gotten used to in recent years, the ability to connect with voters is essential. It could very well be what puts Trump over the finishing line in two years.
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